Police, not just spies, to get increased snooping powers

Police forces will get boosted powers to access phone and internet data under the government's plans for revised surveillance laws.

The Investigatory Powers Bill, which has been revised by the Home Office after critical reports from committees of MPs, will now allow police forces to access all web browsing records in certain investigations. Previously this was limited to illegal websites.

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Major police forces and the National Crime Agency will also get the ability under the law to remotely hack into phones, servers, computers, and more when their investigations involve a "threat to life". Threats to life include cases where someone's mental health may be at risk, the revised version of the bill says.

The bill was first presented to parliament in November when Theresa May said the legislation would become a "world leading" example of surveillance laws. May has now said the re-drafted version of the planned law, which she hopes be enforced as law by 2017, has been changed reflect most of the recommendations put forward by three critical reports. The Home Office has published a response from the government to three critical reports and an additional six codes of practice explaining how the powers in the bill may be used.

One contentious area of the 300-page law has been whether companies will have decipher communications sent using end-to-end encryption platforms. Technology companies had previously said the Home Office's solution of requiring messages to be decrypted when it was "reasonably practical" was confusing.

Under the altered plans no company will be forced to decrypt communications unless they are technically feasible. This is expected to applied to both companies and internet service providers.

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The Home Office said it has produced a "much clearer bill" and has "made the privacy safeguards clearer and stronger". However, critics of the law have said the changes are small. Campaign group Privacy International said the bill is "truly world-leading, for all the wrong reasons." "The Intelligence and Security Committee called for a new chapter consolidating and strengthening privacy in the Bill; the Home Office has responded by adding one word in the title of Part 1. It would be shameful to even consider this change cosmetic," Dr. Gus Hosein, executive Director of Privacy International said.

Meanwhile human rights group Liberty said the bill has received "minor botox".

The Home Office has also reiterated its plan to ensure the legilslation is in force by the end of the year. " By introducing it now, the government is ensuring that this important piece of legislation will be subject to full and thorough scrutiny by both Houses of Parliament, following the normal Parliamentary timetable," it says